The Weight A Hero Can't Bare Part Four
by FanofTrueLove
Summary: That's right people this the fourth installment of the story and I actually spelled bare right. Once you finish reading be sure to rate, review, or PM me so I can see what you think.


The seconds felt like days and the beating of her heart seemed to shake the earth around her as Chloe sat against Alicia's grave staring at the letter addressed to her. The letter was no different than any of the others that she had seen before but the fact that she had one addressed to her made it seem foreign and scary to her. On the front of the envelope, right in the center was her name in Clark's elaborate cursive handwriting that she had hardly ever seen him use. Looking up from the envelope Chloe looked out in the direction Clark had taken off in and recounted the events that had transpired before she was left to the tortures of an unread letter.

First finding her best friend lying in the dirt turning in pain from the dream or nightmare he was having. Second he kissed her and it didn't take long before she was kissing him back with all the bottled up passion that she had kept hidden away since the first time they met. Lastly he gave her the letter and left. No matter how many times she thought about what had happened the tears continued to fall and her mind couldn't stop drawing possible conclusions to what might be written. Slowly Chloe's gaze fell back to the envelope and she sucked in the tears and braced herself for what she might discover in the letter's content. Turning it over she carefully started to peel back the top and reached inside for the letter and began to pull it out. Setting the envelope aside Chloe opened the top fold of the letter and closed her eyes to ready herself. Her heartbeats finally steadied and calmed at least to the point that they weren't registered on the Richter scale and she opened eyes and started to read:

_Dear Chloe, _

_I-_

"Watchtower, come in!"

Jumping at least a foot in the air Chloe placed the letter back in the envelope and grabbed her Watchtower communicator from her back pocket. "Watchtower, what's the situation?"

It took almost every ounce of her being to soothe her voice so that she wouldn't alarm the others and send them out on a panic. Even more was used to tear her vision from the letter and to put it down beside her so that she could focus on the conversation.

"This is Cyborg, where did you go? You left the tower without letting Bart and Dinah know what you were doing."

"Sorry I just had an idea on where I might find Clark."

"Did you find anything? All of our other search parties have come up with scratch and we're running low on ideas," he said with a defeated tone.

Chloe looked down at the letter in her hand and made the decision that would work out for the best. Taking a deep breath she responded, "No it was a dead end."

"Damn, alright head back to HQ so we can restrategize and find Clark."

"I'll be back soon but first I need to stop home and clean up I think if I just take a few minutes I might come up with a plan to find Clark," Chloe said adding to her lies.

"Alright I'll see you back at Watchtower, Cyborg out."

Letting out a breath she didn't know she has holding Chloe tucked her communicator away and hurried to her car with the letter firmly in her hand. Once in the car Chloe placed the letter in the passenger and pulled out of the cemetery and onto the road to the Isis Foundation building. After the long drive she grabbed the letter and rushed into her office and locked the door to prevent anyone from walking in on her as she hurried to her desk. Once seated Chloe opened up the hidden monitor room and walked inside ignoring all the data that was being displayed on the screens covering the walls. On the other side of the room Chloe knelt down at one of the corners of the center monitor and gently pulled out of place so that she could swing the monitor out to reveal her hidden safe. No matter cliché it was Chloe made sure it was secure by installing multiple security protocols that only she could access to protect the contents inside. Lying on the shelf was mainly just Watchtower business along with a few personal items and an emergency kit incase she was ever compromised. Clearing away some files by pushing them to the side Chloe cleared a spot for Clark's letter to lay until she had the chance to read it in a place she knew was safe.

If she were to come back to Watchtower and the others to present her letter then she would have to clarify on what had happened at the cemetery when she still didn't fully understand. Another reason was just for her own personal comfort, knowing that Clark had given her a letter and dashed off after one kiss caused Chloe's sense of caution to skyrocket. _Clark please wait for me, I swear I will save you I just need some time, Chloe thought. _Rising from the safe she closed it and set all security systems on high alert and left the Isis Foundation to head for Watchtower and act as though she still had no new leads. The only problem was she would have to deal with a telepath, a sorceress, and at least six people who can detect a lie from a mile away. The only thing Chloe could do was hope that they would all be preoccupied so that she could just quietly go about her business in the search for Clark.

* * *

Once at Watchtower Chloe was relieved to see that all of her main concerns of exposure were still gone but there was still one person that she knew she had to be wary of: Oliver Queen. Standing with his fists on a desk Oliver was staring at a global map displayed on one of the monitors and by the look in his eyes he was not happy. Stepping cautiously up to the desk Chloe broke the silence, "This is probably one of the only times I've seen this place so quiet in a long time."

Breaking his staring contest with the screen Oliver turned to look over his shoulder at Chloe as she walked up and stood beside him at the desk. "Don't get used to it," he said in a cold voice. _Oh no, something happened the only time I hear him use that voice is when something bad happened, Chloe thought. _Without trying to extract the information on what had happened she attempted to side-step around to try and find out on her own so that she wouldn't risk the fury of a long and short distance fighter. "So what is a billionaire playboy doing in a place like this when he usually is seen out in the clubs?"

"We may have a lead," he said in a dry tone. Looking down at the desk Oliver picked up a remote and clicked a few buttons and the screen switched to a black and white setting with red lines crossing everywhere on the map. "After crossing off every possible lead we had Bart surprisingly contributed something to the search. He mentioned that he is able to outrun Clark and he can run past the sound barrier while Clark is right on the sound barrier or just slightly above."

"Alright just two things: one that is great that we have a lead. Two are you sure that Bart actually said all of that?"

Letting out a sigh Oliver continued, "Emil and Victor came up with the second part, Bart just said that he was faster but aside from that it gave those guys an idea to work off of. They used my satellites to track the paths of anything moving at a speed over the sound barrier and traced the locations. Once they eliminated all of the trails that were Bart's they traced Clark's trails over the course of the last two weeks or so and we think that we may know where he's been hiding at."

"Oh my god, that's great! What are we waiting for we should go get the team and head out to his location as soon as possible."

As Chloe said this she started to grab her coat and keys to head out the door to her car before Oliver's hand grabbed her wrist tightly and made her drop her keys. "Oliver that hurts let go of me!"

"Stop and look at the trails."

Releasing his hand from her wrist Oliver walked Chloe back to where they were standing and pointed to a spot in the center of the map where most of the highlighted trails ended. It took a moment but Chloe realized what Oliver was trying to show her about Clark's location. "He's back in the 33.1 we thought we shut down in Asia," Oliver said as he turned to face Chloe.

He started to speak and tried to comfort her to let her know what they were planning but she didn't hear him. Everything around her melted away into blackness and she felt weightless to the world she was now in. Wherever she was it suited what was going through her heart and mind, if a 33.1 was involved then that meant that Lex wouldn't be far behind pulling the strings. The darkness mirrored the stillness of her heart and body as she weightlessly floated in this strange altered paradise. The silence that echoed endlessly also echoed what was happening in her mind: hopelessness. Just the thought or idea that Lex was behind the problems with Clark's sanity didn't surprise her since he had tried and failed many times to find out his secret and on multiple occasions tried to kill him as well. The only difference was that this time they may already be too late to save Clark from Lex and his twisted nature. Every other time Clark had the upper hand and the strong moral grounds that kept him in check when it came to dealing with Lex and his schemes but now he might have revealed his Achilles' heel. His breakup with Lana Lang had only been a week or so before he apparently went MIA and no one bothered to tell Chloe. Sending him out on a mission even with a team was a bad idea because of his depressed state and the fact that they we're walking into a devil's lair with hardly any idea of what they might encounter once they reached the main labs. Without the strong morals that Clark had grown up with underneath him he could easily have fallen into Lex's greedy clutches and if he had then they may not be able to save him in time.

Chloe's body continued to float through the oblivion of her mind until she felt a cold, wet cloth across her forehead. The sudden sensation of the rag caused Chloe to suddenly open her eyes and throw herself into a sitting position. "Chloe, calm down you need to get some more rest."

Chloe turned to see Oliver kneeling beside her on one of the couches dressed in his Green Arrow costume. He gently grabbed one of her shoulders and pushed Chloe until she was laying back down much to her opposition. After he repositioned the rag on her forehead he spoke, "You passed out when I showed you where Clark was, I was hoping that you would at least be out until Emil got here so that I could head out and avoid this but here we are." Taking a deep breath Oliver stood up and took a few paces before turning around to speak only to open and close his mouth again in his pursuit for the right words. Growing frustrated Chloe got up and shouted, "Oliver would you just tell me already!"

Throwing his hands up in surrender Oliver began, "You passed out before I had the chance to tell you what we planning on doing and I was hoping that I wouldn't have to tell you until after the mission was complete," letting out a sigh he continued. "I've sent ahead almost everyone to a location a few miles away from the lab and I was about to head out with the last of the group, we plan on rescuing Clark but we have to kill Lex in the process."

Chloe was a little shocked by the plan that was being presented to her, sure she'd love to see one of the greatest evils removed from the equation but she knew Clark would never want that to happen even if it meant his own life. "Oliver you know that Clark wouldn't want you to kill him and besides how are you even going to reach him? Do you even know if he's there? We both know what Lex is capable of and he could have an entire army ready to defend him and kill all of you guys."

"That's why we sent in the earlier teams that are the best we have for reconnaissance so we're prepared for whatever Lex might throw at us," Oliver said as he grabbed his bow and backed up towards the door.

"But what about killing Lex? If you do kill him and save Clark then you'll have to deal with him and I don't think that we want to cause more drama than what's necessary," Chloe said as she strode towards Oliver.

"Clark needs to see the bigger picture and I was right when I thought that you might need to see it too," with that Oliver whipped out a remote from his back pocket and pressed a single button. The Watchtower security system went off and sealed off all the exits and entrances along with the stain glass windows that covered the walls.

"Oliver what do you think you're doing?"

"Ensuring that the world is a safer place."

Without a chance to respond Oliver put on a gas mask and hit another button on the remote in his hand. Small vents rose from the walls and let out a disgusting smelling gas that burned Chloe's throat and eyes. The sensation didn't last long before her eyes began to heavily close and caused her to fight to stay awake as she sunk to her knees. Looking back at the blurred green figure of Oliver, Chloe stayed awake and responsive enough to gather the last of her strength to call out, "Oliver! Stop! You can't do this!"

Oliver ignored the pleas of his friend and donned his hood and sunglasses before unlocking one of the doors and walking out. Once outside Oliver turned to rescuer the door but hesitated as he watch Chloe succumb to the oblivion she had just awakened from. Pushing the doubt from his mind he pushed the button and watched as thick metal panels emerged from the walls and narrowed the view inside the room onto Chloe and continued to narrow until it closed completely.

Putting the remote back in his pocket Oliver began walking towards the elevator to the roof but before he entered he stopped and turned to look back at the cold metal panels and whispered a single phrase, "Please forgive me."


End file.
